Cash Rewards For Weight Loss Favored By Employees

There’s a growing number of companies who are at present providing new weight loss incentive strategies to inspire healthful practices and lifestyles around work settings. Researchers from the University of Michigan have discovered that rewards in the form of money are a successful kind of incentive for weight loss according to their study.

The Affordable Care Act has made employers capable of providing substantial financial incentives to urge nourishing practices like quitting smoking and losing excess weight. Nevertheless, the study has also discovered that weight loss is even more effective whenever rewards depend on group performance as compared to individual performance. When cash rewards depended on group performance, workers dropped virtually 3X more weight than a single employee performance.

The study’s lead author, Jeffrey T. Kullgren, M.D., M.S., M.P.H., health services researcher in the VA Center for Clinical Management Research and the division of general medicine in the U-M Medical School stated that:

“There is broad and growing enthusiasm for rewarding healthy behaviors in the workplace, but there is little evidence on the effects of these strategies. We anticipate more employers to offer these awards in an effort to help control health care costs while also improving the health of employees. “

He also added that those incentives were considerately more influential once provided in groups or teams. The study concerned analyzing the efficiency of two varying weight loss incentive schemes in the city of Philadelphia, U.S.A. One of the teams involved participants who were provided cash awards of $100.00 each month if they succeeded in their weight-loss targets.

The other team got occupied with placing individuals into teams of five with cash rewards of $500.00 which can be split among themselves once they reached their goal for weight loss. This strategy permitted people to possibly succeed more than a hundred dollars if other participants in their team were ineffective in reaching their goal. 6 months afterwards, those who took part by group lost more weight than those who participated solo. Kullgren was quoted as saying, “Despite the health and economic consequences of obesity, the problem isn’t getting any better, and there is great interest in identifying new approaches to combating this major health issue in our country.”

The Affordable Care Act which is also known as Obamacare, was established last march 23, 2010 to enhance and extend health coverage between American citizens. This act permits employers to give incentives to employees who take part in wellness programs and reach their health goals.

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